December 2003 - cypherpunks-legacy

AOL crashes and burns
by Warrior 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Great news, eh?

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Freedom vs. US-Citizens
by nobody＠zifi.genetics.utah.edu 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

http://www.yahoo.com/headlines/960808/news/stories/crashpoll_1.html Thursday August 8 1:14 PM EDT Terrorism Fears Prompt Support for Limits LOS ANGELES (Reuter) - Most U.S. citizens are willing to give up some civil liberties in order to fight terrorism, according to a poll published Thursday. A nationwide survey conducted by the Los Angeles Times after the explosion of TWA Flight 800 and the bombing at Atlanta's Centennial Olympic Park also showed that Americans favored economic sanctions over military action against countries involved in terrorism. It found that 65 percent of those surveyed were somewhat or very concerned that the fight against terrorism could bring restrictions on civil liberties but 58 percent said they would be willing to give up some liberties to help curb terrorism. Government and aviation officials have indicated that increased security measures at airports around the country could mean more thorough and time-consuming inspections of luggage, questioning of travelers and higher fares. Of those polled, 66 percent said they strongly favoured more secure airports, even at such costs, while 17 percent said they ``somewhat favoured'' such measures. Asked what action, in addition to trying those individuals responsible, the United States should take if the TWA crash is linked to another country, 40 percent favoured economic sanctions against that nation, 14 percent opted for military action, 10 percent thought both should be used and 8 percent thought no action should be taken apart from a trial. The telephone survey of 1,572 adults was conducted from Aug. 3 through Aug. 6 and had a margin of error of plus or minus three percentage points.

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Re: Anonymous Remailers at work
by E. ALLEN SMITH 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

I've been trying to encourage the scientific ethics people to have an email address for tips + information about using anonymous remailers. As can be seen by the first part (lack of an email address), I haven't gotten very far as yet... -Allen

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Basic Unix Hacking
by CTH 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

Is there a way to get a .plan file to execute shell script when it is read by finger?? I'm sure this is an old question, but it seems there must be a way. echo \"date\" or some damn thing that will execute as opposed to printing. The fingerD I am working with does not seem to call a .fingerrc file. -Chris .. But there *are* a million monkeys on the net, .. and I still aint seen no Shakespeare! <me> ... ... smtp: nozefngr(a)apple.com .. page: 1.800.680.7351 .. http: http://virtual.net/Personal/nozefngr/ .. icbm: lat37*21'.lon121*5' .. .. the kabuki project: http://remarque.berkeley.edu/kabuki/

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Re: Blurring the Chains of Causation
by E. ALLEN SMITH 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

From: IN%"tcmay(a)got.net" 1-AUG-1996 18:22:25.80 >Many of the proposed restrictions seek to further blur this chain of >causation, by making someone who provides access to materials which _may_ >later be used in a crime, or which may "inspire" someone to crime, a kind >of criminal. [...] >People who actually commit real crimes are the criminals, not those who >sold them Hostess Twinkies without first checking their blood sugar level. >Not those who let a library patron look at a "dangerous" book. And not >those who provided strong cryptographic tools which _might_ be used by >terrorists, pedophiles, and money launderers. Quite. One analogy that should bring things a bit closer to home to liberal types is that of zoning laws and restrictive covanents. The (unfortunately legally accepted) justification, as I understand it, for many zoning laws is that they prevent reductions in property values. Restrictive covanents, such as against blacks or AIDS patients, have the same argument for them, if one accepts the logic of the proposed restrictions. Blacks/whoever moving in causes racists (or people anticipating the actions of racists) not to want to move in or causes them to sell; this reduces local property values. By the logic of the proposed restrictions, that means blacks/whoever should be held responsible for the decrease in property values and barred or fined. Obviously, this whole idea is nonsense... only if you're the last _person_ in a chain of causation are you the person making a decision for which you should be blameable. (By person I refer to that people are the only beings capable of making such a choice. I neither treat cows as having rights/choices nor do I hold a bull criminally responsible for goring someone. Rights mean responsibility; choices mean consequences.) Otherwise, someone else has the chance to make their own decision and avert the negative results.... or not. -Allen

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Re: AOL crashes and burns
by tcmay＠got.net 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

At 8:16 PM 8/8/96, Warrior wrote: >Great news, eh? No big deal, as I see it. The only reason the AOL outage made the headlines is because of market share. My own local ISP goes out at times, sometimes for more than a day. And judging by the comments of others here (e.g, "my connection has been flaky," "My ISP was down for the past few days," "Could someone mail me the last 3 days worth of traffic?"), I suspect this is common. Market share is what generates headlines. --Tim May Boycott "Big Brother Inside" software! We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, we know that that ain't allowed. ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay(a)got.net 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Licensed Ontologist | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."

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Re: Stealth cookies
by E. ALLEN SMITH 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

From: IN%"stewarts(a)ix.netcom.com" "Bill Stewart" 7-AUG-1996 06:58:56.42 >However, there's a way to cheat the cookie spec; I don't know >if this was intentional, but it was realized quickly by the market :-) >The issue is that your browser sends along an HTTP_REFERRER variable, >which points to the last page you visited before the current page. >It's useful for sites to find out where their pages are being referenced, >and they may (legitimately) want to only give out information if you're >coming from one of their previous pages. Does www.anonymizer.com filter out cookies and their requests? I'd also be curious if an alternate means of specifying the url (without having to manually type it in) is possible such that people would have problems doing a search for all pages connecting to a page. I.e., currently, I can search for pages connecting to a particular page through the anonymizer via doing an AltaVista search for link:/page/in/which/i'm/interested.html. If the person had to realize that, say, they had to do a search for page__in__which__i'm__interested.html, that could make unfriendly tracing of backlinks - sensitive backlinks if you're using the anonymizer - more difficult. -Allen P.S. The problem with blank pages from the anonymizer seems to be fixed, or at least I haven't run into it recently - thanks.

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visual programming
by Vladimir Z. Nuri 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

"cpunks write code". the whole concept of writing code may fundamentally shift in the future to something that is far more visually oriented. I tend to think so and think that this idea will be particularly fruitfully explored relative to virtual reality. I believe that in the future, code will be written neither with "code" nor with "writing", so to speak. this is a blurb out of Xeroc Parc, the same organization that brought you the revolutionary wysiwyg GUI, the mouse, the file/folder analogy, etc. imagine that as a programmer, you could see an animated presentation of your code operation at all times. it would be an incredible development and debugging tool. it is quite a few years away, but I think it is inevitable. what is interesting is that visual programming is not necessarily a replacement for computer languages. it could be seen as just another layer of abstraction on top of source code, i.e. a means of generating source code, which could be in any language du-jour such as Java. in fact I think this is the way visual languages will first make their way into commercial environments-- by meshing with all the existing language baggage. ------- Forwarded Message Newsgroups: ba.seminars,comp.human-factors,comp.cog-eng,comp.groupware Subject: BayCHI (Aug 13) - Programming as a Video Game, plus Exploring the World of a Product Date: 6 Aug 1996 01:23:33 GMT Organization: Usability Adventures BayCHI, the San Francisco Bay Area ACM SIGCHI (Special Interest Group on Computer-Human Interaction), announces its August meeting: Tuesday, August 13, 1996 7:30 - 9:30 pm Programming as a Video Game or ToonTalk -- A Video Game for Creating Programs Ken Kahn, Animated Programs + Exploring the World of a Product: the Light Switch Exploration Project Sam Hecht, IDEO Product Development Xerox PARC Auditorium 3333 Coyote Hill Road Palo Alto, CA 94304 <BayCHI meeting attendance is free & open to the public.> <BayCHI programs are not videotaped, and taping by attendees is not permitted.> Abstract of "Programming as a Video Game or ToonTalk -- A Video Game for Creating Programs": Seymour Papert once described the design of the Logo programming language as taking the best ideas in computer science about programming language design and "child engineering" them. Twenty-five years after Logo's birth, there has been tremendous progress in programming language research and in computer-human interfaces. Programming languages exist now that are very expressive and mathematically very elegant and yet are difficult to learn and master. We believe the time is now ripe to attempt to repeat the success of the designers of Logo by child engineering one of these modern languages. When Logo was first built, a critical aspect was taking the computational constructs of the Lisp programming language and designing a child friendly syntax for them. Lisp's "CAR" was replaced by "FIRST", "DEFUN" by "TO", parentheses were eliminated, and so on. Today there are totally visual languages in which programs exist as pictures and not as text. We believe this is a step in the right direction, but even better than visual programs are animated programs. Animation is much better suited for dealing with the dynamics of computer programs than static icons or diagrams. While there has been substantial progress in graphical user interfaces in the last twenty-five years, we chose to look not primarily at the desktop metaphor for ideas but instead at video games. Video games are typically more direct, more concrete, and easier to learn than other software. And more fun too. We have constructed a general-purpose concurrent programming system, ToonTalk (TM), in which the source code is animated and the programming environment is a video game. Every abstract computational aspect is mapped into a concrete metaphor. For example, a computation is a city, an active object or agent is a house, birds carry messages between houses, a method or clause is a robot trained by the user and so on. The programmer controls a "programmer persona" in this video world to construct, run, debug and modify programs. We believe that ToonTalk is especially well suited for giving children the opportunity to build real programs in a manner that is easy to learn and fun to do. A live demo of ToonTalk will be given. (See http://www.toontalk.com.) ----- o ----- Abstract of "Exploring the World of a Product: the Light Switch Exploration Project": Initiated by IDEO industrial designers in San Francisco, the Light Switch exploration is the first in a series of projects which explore the world of a product. The benefits, other than those which are delivered within each design, is to expand each designer's mind, but formulated within a group. The group deliberately chose the humblest of product interfaces for exploration, asking that the test was in the using. It was felt strongly that this type of project would be able to indirectly inspire some of the more complex products that IDEO usually works with, and which the layman eventually has to operate. The approach taken was rooted heavily in both a large vocabulary of materials and the appraisal of a light switch within its environment. The group started the project by examining the history and context of a light switch and discovered that it was praticularly easy to move away from preconceptions which seem to have plagued many earlier attempts by designers. This was further achieved by the group developing contextual platforms for particular scenarios based on the relationships between object and light; control and light; the manipulation of light; and the interaction with a switch. The root in material also inspired totally new ways of both manufacturing and operating a light switch. It would be wrong to suggest that these designs are anything more than concepts, but because they were created within an environment that is populated by Human Factors, Engineering, and Interaction Design, they hold many of the concerns which are evoked by these professions. The group extended the concept of "using" by creating working prototypes. These were exhibited as part of the "Mutant Materials in Design" exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Here, the public were able to interact with each switch in its proper context; that being to turn a light bulb on and off. New surprises were observed - such as people stroking a switch that only required the slightest of contact. What was happening, of course, was that relationships were being created between object and user. The exploration was awarded the 1995 annual design award for concepts and the CHI'96 video award for design, and was part of the International Design Yearbook for 1996. Biographies: ToonTalk was designed and built by KEN KAHN <kahn(a)csli.stanford.edu> who, after earning a doctorate in computer science from MIT, spent more than 15 years as a researcher in programming languages, computer animation, and programming systems for children. He has been a faculty member at MIT, University of Stockholm, and Uppsala University. For over eight years he was a researcher at Xerox PARC. During the 1970s he made several animated films which were shown in film festivals, theaters, and cable TV. In 1992, Ken founded Animated Programs whose mission is to make computer programming child's play. His patent application covering the underlying technology of ToonTalk has recently been approved by the US Patent Office. David, Ken's 11 year-old son, will be running the demos during the talk. ----- o ----- SAM HECHT joined IDEO in 1994 after working in the areas of interior design, architecture, industrial design, and graphic design. He has worked in the studios of David Chipperfield in London, Studia design group in Tel-Aviv, IDEO product development in San Francisco, and now currently as a senior industrial designer at IDEO in Tokyo. In San Francisco, he created designs for large corporations in the fields of furniture for Steelcase America, computer monitors for NEC Japan, and recently telephones for AT&T of America. After graduating from the Royal College of Art in London, he started to investigate the border between object and environment, which he exercised in a number of interiors. This interest was furthered with the designs of the offices of IDEO in both San Francisco and Tokyo, which challenge our thinking of the office environment - layered with the philosophy of multi-disciplinary team working that IDEO employs. He is also responsible for curating the IDEO design explorations that occur each year. In Tokyo, he is currently focusing on the design of objects of a smaller scale. His work has won several awards; has been exhibited in Europe, America, and Asia; and has been published in leading journals throughout the world. ************************************************************************ ************************************************************************ NOTES OF SPONSORSHIP & THANKS BayCHI thanks Jock MacKinlay and Stu Card of Xerox PARC for sponsoring our use of the Xerox PARC auditorium for BayCHI monthly meetings. ************************************************************************ BayCHI's September meeting: September 10 location: Xerox PARC Auditorium, Palo Alto ************************************************************************ About BayCHI BayCHI, the San Francisco Bay Area chapter of ACM's Special Interest Group on Computer-Human Interaction, brings together systems designers, human factors engineers, computer scientists, psychologists, social scientists, users, software engineers, product managers, ... from throughout the Bay Area to hear and to exchange ideas about computer-human interaction and about the design and evaluation of user interfaces. To join BayCHI, which will get you added to the mailing list for the newsletter, enable your access to the jobbank, enable your listing in the consultants directory, get you a copy of the directory of BayCHI members, ..., send a note to cstreeter.chi(a)xerox.com or to BayCHI, PO Box 25, Menlo Park, CA 94026, and we will send you a printed membership form. Membership forms are also available at the BayCHI meetings; plus, a membership form is appended to this announcement. Additional information about BayCHI is available at BayCHI's evolving World Wide Web site: http://www.baychi.org/. For program updates and to leave messages, call 408-235-9244. ************************************************************************ BayCHI Steering Committee The BayCHI steering committee meetings are open to anyone who is interested in attending. The meetings are generally held the first Tuesday of the month at 7:30 p.m. Please contact any member of the committee for directions to the meeting. Chair Bob Weissman weissman.chi(a)xerox.com Vice Chair Clark Streeter cstreeter.chi(a)xerox.com Treasurer Fred Jacobson jacobson.chi(a)xerox.com Program Chair Richard Anderson rianderson.chi(a)xerox.com Membership Chair Don Patterson patterson.chi(a)xerox.com Newsletter Editor Fred Jacobson jacobson.chi(a)xerox.com Dinner Coordinator Diane Cerra dcerra(a)mkp.com Webmistress Christina Gibbs cgibbs.chi(a)xerox.com Job Bank Mark Fernandes mark_fernandes.chi(a)xerox.com Publicity Chair Christina Gibbs cgibbs.chi(a)xerox.com Tutorial Chair David Rowley rowley.chi(a)xerox.com CHI Calendar Megan Eskey eskey.chi(a)xerox.com Consultants Directory Dave Salvator salvator.chi(a)xerox.com Strng Comm Mtg Host Ulrike Creach creach.chi(a)xerox.com Newsletter Distr. Joseph Jarosz jarosz.chi(a)xerox.com Volunteer Coordinator Clark Streeter cstreeter.chi(a)xerox.com Elections Chair (open position) SIGCHI Liaison Don Patterson patterson.chi(a)xerox.com International Liaison Susan Wolfe wolfe.chi(a)xerox.com BAHFES Liaison Robert Kaplan kaplan.chi(a)xerox.com Xerox PARC host Jock Mackinlay mackinlay.chi(a)xerox.com Past Chair ('95-'96) David Rowley rowley.chi(a)xerox.com Past Chair ('93-'95) Ellen Francik francik.chi(a)xerox.com Past Chair ('92-'93) Richard Anderson rianderson.chi(a)xerox.com At-large Allison Hansen ahansen.chi(a)xerox.com At-large Howard Tamler htamler.chi(a)xerox.com At-large Mike Van Riper vanriper.chi(a)xerox.com BayCHI -- P.O. Box 25 -- Menlo Park, CA -- 94026 ************************************************************************ DIRECTIONS TO XEROX PARC >From Highway 280, take the Page Mill Road exit. Go east one mile to Coyote Hill Road (no light) and turn right. Go 1/2 mile and PARC will be on your left. Follow the signs to the auditorium. >From 101, take the Oregon Expressway exit west 2 miles to El Camino Real. Oregon Expressway becomes Page Mill Road at El Camino Real. Follow Page Mill Road 1.7 miles to Coyote Hill Road (no light) and turn left. Coyote Hill Road is just past the intersection with Foothill Expressway. Go 1/2 mile and PARC will be on your left. Follow the signs to the auditorium. For a map, see http://www.parc.xerox.com/images/maptoparc.gif. ************************************************************************ O / \ O -----------X------------ Cut Here ------------X----------- O \ / O BayCHI Membership Form (Version: 8 February 1996) - ---------------------- Name: ________________________ ____________ _____________________________ (First) (MI) (Last) Nickname (optional): _________________________ (for Membership Card/Badge name if other than above) Preferred Email:_________________________________________________________ Secondary Email:_________________________________________________________ Web Address (URL):_______________________________________________________ Home Contact Information Address: ___________________________________________________________ ____________________, _______ __________________ ________ City State Postal / City Code Country Phone: (_____)____________________ FAX: (_____)___________________ Business Contact Information Company / Affiliation: _____________________________________________ Department: _____________________________________________ Address: ___________________________________________________________ ____________________, _______ __________________ ________ City State Postal / City Code Country Phone: (_____)____________________ FAX: (_____)___________________ Preferred Mailing Address (circle one): Home Business Email Only Newsletter delivery via (circle one): Email Surface Check if you DO NOT want to be included in the Membership Directory? ____ Check if you want to receive Job Bank postings: ____ Interests and Expertise (for Membership Directory listing - up to 90 char) Circle if member of: ACM SIGCHI ACM Member Number: _________________________________ Membership Fees: $15.00 for New Members $10.00 for Renewing Members Payment Enclosed : $_______ Date: __________ Payment by (circle one): Cash Personal Check Business Check Other Please mail this form, along with a check payable to BayCHI, to: Don Patterson, 757 Avalon Way, Livermore, CA 94550 ************************************************************************ ------- End of Forwarded Message

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Edited Edupage, 1-Aug-1996
by E. ALLEN SMITH 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

From: IN%"educom(a)educom.unc.edu" 1-AUG-1996 17:11:49.07 To: IN%"edupage(a)elanor.oit.unc.edu" "EDUCOM Edupage Mailing List" >***************************************************************** >Edupage, 1 August 1996. Edupage, a summary of news about information >technology, is provided three times a week as a service by Educom, >a Washington, D.C.-based consortium of leading colleges and universities >seeking to transform education through the use of information technology. >***************************************************************** [...] >CELLULAR PHONE COMPANIES FIGHT CLONING >To fight the illegal practice called "cloning," cellular telephone carriers >will be adopting new "smart phone" technology intended to foil high-tech >criminals by matching calls with encoded passwords. In cloning, pirates >use portable scanners and computers to intercept the cellular phone user's >phone and serial numbers as they are being broadcast to a transmitting >tower or "cell site." The new digital phones will contain a non-clonable >''smart cards'' that encrypt the identifying information to prevent >scanners from eavesdropping or cloning the customer's telephone number. >(San Jose Mercury News 1 Aug 96) It sounds like the "smart cards" will have some chip oddities to try to prevent reading them - something in TCMay's department. I do wonder whether they're going to have one key for all of them, or differing keys for each user. If the former, then cracking one (which I get the impression is quite possible) equals cracking all, of course. >G7 LEADERS & THE INTERNET >Experts on electronic communications said ideas presented by G7 leaders for >fighting terrorism by restricting access to the Internet are "naive and >probably unworkable" because there are too many ways to circumvent >censorship on the Net to believe regulation could prevent terrorists from >using the technology for communications. (Toronto Globe & Mail 1 Aug 96 >A4) Yes... although it could be rather inconvenient. >CANADIAN SERVICE PROVIDERS TACKLE OBJECTIONABLE MATERIAL >Canadian access providers are developing guidelines for dealing with >potentially objectionable material and have set up a code of conduct >committee, with goals that include establishing guidelines members can use >to determine if information stored on their servers is illegal. (Toronto >Globe & Mail 1 Aug 96 B1) [...] >CERTIFIED WEB SITES >The National Computer Security Association in Carlisle, PA., will certify >that a Web site meets minimum security specifications, including the >presence of firewalls, use of passwords, and encryption of sensitive data >transmission. Certifications costs $8500 a year and requires that the site >submit to remote tests, an NCSA site visit, and random compliance audits. >(Computerworld 29 Jul 96 p2) One hopes that the level of encryption will be required to be above single DES, at least... >Edupage is written by John Gehl <gehl(a)educom.edu> & Suzanne Douglas ><douglas(a)educom.edu>. Voice: 404-371-1853, Fax: 404-371-8057. >Technical support is provided by Information Technology Services at the >University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. >*************************************************************** >Edupage ... is what you've just finished reading. To subscribe to Edupage: >send mail to: listproc(a)educom.unc.edu with the message: subscribe edupage >Gene Fullmer (if your name is Gene Fullmer; otherwise, substitute your >own name). ... To cancel, send a message to: listproc(a)educom.unc.edu with >the message: unsubscribe edupage. (If you have subscription problems, >send mail to manager(a)educom.unc.edu.)

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Re: PGP public key servers are NOT useful!
by Omegaman 17 Dec '03

17 Dec '03

> What I want to prevent is some person I dislike uploading his > signature on my key Yes, that's unpreventable. It still does not change the fact that it is up to the person using your public key to determine if you are indeed that actual owner of that key. > How would you like it if I added a new ID to your key containing sort > of insult, certified that ID, and uploaded the new signature to the > key servers. RTFM. Look, go into PGP and try to change your key ID. You will note that PGP asks you to provide the passphrase to your secret key before allowing an id change. Someone could not get your public key off of a keyserver and change the id of the key. The need both your secret key and your passphrase to do that. Now someone could create a key-pair themselves and falsely assign your e-mail address and some miscellaneous crap as the ID. They could then upload the"rogue" public key portion of this keypair to the servers. However, the falsity of this "rogue" public key can be easily determined by you and anyone who is trying to communicate securely with you. All of this is explained with great clarity in the PGP documentation. Think about this... Suppose I knew who you were and knew your e-mail address. What's to stop me from creating a "rogue" key-pair with your address as the e-mail id and uploading it to the keyservers? Just because you don't utilize the keyservers, doesn't mean your public key can't be placed there. "Controlling" the distribution of your public key is giving you a false sense of security where none is really needed. Ponder: why is a public key called a "public" key? "Controlling" the distribution of you public key is a pointless exercise. Controlling authentication is what you and those who communicate securely with you whould be concerned about. me -------------------------------------------------------------- Omegaman <omega(a)bigeasy.com> PGP Key fingerprint = 6D 31 C3 00 77 8C D1 C2 59 0A 01 E3 AF 81 94 63 Send a message with the text "get key" in the "Subject:" field to get a copy of my public key. --------------------------------------------------------------

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